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Perceived risks still influence pregnant women’s intent to vaccinate
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BETHESDA, Md. — Future vaccination promotion efforts should target pregnant women’s concerns about the severity of pertussis to infants and the risks of influenza vaccination during pregnancy, according to study findings presented here.
Allison Chamberlain, MS, of Emory University, and colleagues assessed 325 pregnant women’s knowledge and beliefs about influenza, pertussis and vaccination during pregnancy. The mean age of the study participants was 27.2 years, and they had not received the 2012-2013 influenza and tetanus-diphtheria-acellular pertussis vaccines during their current pregnancy. The researchers’ main goal was to evaluate the efficacy of their influenza vaccine promotion package.
Forty-six percent of the participants considered influenza vaccination during pregnancy to be risky. Of those, 80% were not likely receive an influenza vaccine and 67% were not likely to receive Tdap. Of the 54% of women who considered vaccination safe, 52% were not likely to receive an influenza vaccination and 46% were not likely to receive Tdap. The majority of study participants believed their risk for influenza and pertussis was serious, and more than half were not likely to get vaccinated. Of the 283 women who considered infants’ risk for influenza to be serious, 64% were not likely to be vaccinated. Of the 298 women who considered infants’ risk for pertussis to be serious, 53% were not likely to be vaccinated.
History of seasonal influenza vaccination, negative perception of vaccination and concern for pertussis severity for infants were associated with participants’ intent to receive an influenza vaccine. Similar factors were associated with participants’ intent to receive Tdap; however, race also was a factor.
“It seems we’re making some headway in terms of making influenza vaccine more accepted among pregnant women, but we still have a ways to go in order to achieve that 80% goal by 2020. Despite awareness of risks, many women remain reluctant to receive vaccinations during pregnancy, and we will be interested to tease out a little bit more of these preconceptions to the influenza vaccines and vaccines that have been around for a while, and how that impacts the likelihood of receiving vaccines that become recommended directly, like Tdap. Perceived severity of pertussis to infants may influence the likelihood of vaccine receipt. So we’ll be trying to frame a lot of the packaged materials to talk a little bit more about the severity of these diseases not only to themselves and also to their infants,” Chamberlain said during the presentation.
For more information:
Chamberlain A. Abstract #23. Presented at: Annual Conference on Vaccine Research; April 28-30, 2014; Bethesda, Md.
Disclosure: Chamberlain reports no relevant financial disclosures.